15
THE simile's a very useful thing, This, priests and poets needs must own; For when the clock-work of their brain runs down, A simile winds up the mental spring. For instance, when a priest does scan The Fall of Man And all its consequences dire, He makes him first a little sportive pig -- So clean, so innocent, so trig -- And then an aged sow, deep wallowing in the mire! Yes, sure the simile's a useful thing; Another instance I will bring. Thou'st own a cork tost on the rain-swell'd stream, Now up, now down, now whirl'd round and round, Yet still 'twould swim, And all the torrent's fury could not drown't: So have I seen a forward, empty fop, Tost in Wit's blanket, ridicul'd, et cetera, Yet, after all the banter, off he'd hop, Quite confident in self-,sufficiency. Ah! had kind heaven, For a defence, Allowed me half the brazen confidence That she to many a cork-brained fool hath given!
© Copyright Len Nicholson, 1996, 1997, 1998